


After The Dust Settles

by cactwerk (ninnie_eats_chips)



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Crown City Insomnia, Established Relationship, F/M, Loss, M/M, Other, Platonic Relationships, Post-Final Fantasy XV, Rebuilding, you could also think of it as non platonic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-08
Updated: 2018-02-08
Packaged: 2020-07-29 02:54:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20074945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninnie_eats_chips/pseuds/cactwerk
Summary: “How does it feel… to lose the thing you loved the most?”Another dialogue prompt from my old blog. Post-ending, though somewhat vague with the spoilers.





	After The Dust Settles

**Author's Note:**

> This one was a double dialogue prompt!;  
1\. “Are you sober?” “I’m moderately functional.”  
2\. “How does it feel….to lose the thing you loved the most?”

You sit cross-legged on a brass barstool next to Ignis Scientia, drinking in the atmosphere of the bar–one of New Insomnia’s (that’s what everyone’s calling it now) first opened breweries since the fall over ten years ago. Add to that a year, and the first business district past the old wall was now alive with celebration. The city was far from fixed. It was going to take many years to fully recover from the damage to your home caused by the Empire. But this was progress. It was the first time that lights lit up inside the city; that a night in Insomnia was alive with music. That some of its residents slept in their beds once more.

Ignis was just… _Drinking._ Something Ignis did not do so often, or in such abundance. A glass of wine here or there, but no more. His tastes were more on the refined side, and as a blind man, it did well not to be stumbling around in darkness. So it came as a surprise to you to see Ignis down more than his fair share of craft beer. Of course he knocked back the amber glass with as much grace as one could _have_ downing a beer, but at this point he probably was going to need more help than his cane could give to make it to a bed tonight.

Your eyes are on Ignis, who is leaning onto the lacquered mahogany surface of the bar. He’s pallid, eyes hooked intensely on the unfinished drink clutched in his fingers, discarded gloves lying inches away. You swish your cocktail around in anticipation to say something, but words elude you.

“You are aware- I’ve told you… I can feel your eyes on me, Dear.”

Ignis’s voice is congested and tired, a little dark. He would have noticed sooner if he wasn’t drinking. You know tries his best but his mind isn’t completely in the right place and you have to ask-

“Are you sober?”

He gives you pause. Then Ignis makes a small click against his teeth and opens his mouth.

“I’m moderately functional.”

You reach over and lay your hand softly over his right hand that rests in a fist on the bar.

“Ignis… You were moderately functional before you had a drink.”

“S’pose I was.” He chuckles darkly, a puff of air escaping his windpipe before his lips turn down again. Aside from the merry voices in the background and the antique jukebox playing on, it’s somehow quiet in what feels like your corner of the world.

You see a tear roll down behind Ignis’s dark frames. It breaks your heart. You know it’s something you can’t fix. He’s lost more than you.

It comes out brashly. With little thought.

“How does it feel… to lose the thing you loved the most?”

For a moment, your heart sinks and you’re so afraid that you’ve said the wrong thing.

To your surprise, the man’s head rises slowly, straightening up his posture. He doesn’t see you but for the first time in a while he _looks_ at you, turns in his seat, turns over his fist and his clammy fingers find yours. Ignis swiftly uses his free thumb to wipe his cheekbone dry.

“I have lost many things that were invaluable to me. Despite that… I’ve not yet lost what I love most… And I do not intend to.”


End file.
